Brig Naseem Akhtar R, Author at Pakistan Observer

Threats to national security

THE gravest threats to national security rarely appear out of nowhere. More often, they announce themselves quietly through small, scattered and apparently unrelated developments…

World becoming harder to predict

After a lifetime of watching conflicts unfold, crises build and decisions being made in the shadows, I have learned to distrust one thing more…

Pakistan’s security: External pressures, internal fault lines

THE battlefield is no longer military. Security competition today operates simultaneously through military power, economics, technology, information, narratives and diplomacy. A conflict thousands of…

Independence beyond celebration Winning the Battle for the National Mind

AS Pakistan marks its Independence Day, 14 August should be more than a day of flags and celebration. It should also be a moment of…

Warning-decision gap: The changing face of strategic surprise

For decades, scholars of intelligence and strategic studies have sought to explain why states continue to suffer strategic surprise despite investing enormous re-sources in intelligence…

The age of strategic endurance

Why distant wars no longer remain distant Every era of international politics tends to be shaped by a dominant strategic idea. During the Cold War,…

When minds become battlefields

FOR centuries, national security was measured by the strength of armies, the sophistication of weapons and the ability to defend territorial borders. Wars were…

Strategy in an age of uncertainty

IN a world of unpredictability, national strength depends not on eliminating uncertainty, but on managing it through intelligence, resilience and long-term thinking. The most…

Azad Kashmir crisis: Impact and lessons

THE recent unrest in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) has exposed internal vulnerabilities that risk undermining Pakistan’s position in the broader Kashmir dispute. At…